The End
by MissJesselle
Summary: Kirk and Spock. Angst. Seriously, people die.


_Star Trek does not belong to me._

*****

The attackers had ambushed them. It was an unfair fight from the beginning: they were outnumbered and the enemy weapons were set to kill. Still, they somehow managed to find cover in the rocky terrain and stand their ground. They had stunned all but one of them and when this last one aimed his gun at Spock who was recovering from the blow he had received into his shoulder and did not have enough time to react, Jim blasted the weapon from the enemy's hand with one shot and took him down with another.

Shuddering slightly from the adrenaline of the battle, Jim walked over to Spock and helped him back to his feet.

"Are you alright? That doesn't look too -"

All of a sudden, there was a whish of a laser weapon, loud and piercing in its unexpectedness. Jim looked confused for a moment, looking at Spock with wide open eyes, but then his knees buckled an he fell to the ground.

Spock looked around frantically, searching for the source of the attack. He spotted movement ahead of them, one of the enemies was extending his weapon, aiming at Spock this time. He must have been only pretending to be stunned, thoughts flashed through Spock's mind, or did he just wake up from from a bad stun shot? But Spock was already firing his phaser at him, stunning him properly this time.

Then he glanced over the others, ascertaining that they were all unconscious. Wasting no more time, he dropped quickly down to Jim, completely ignoring the burning pain in his shoulder. His heart beating faster than ever, he silently observed the dark red blood which was soaking through Jim's shirt on his back. Spock's hands shook a little when he seized Jim's arms, carefully lifted the upper part of his body and turned him to examine his chest.

The darkest of Spock's hidden fears became reality when he saw the extent of the wound. The laser ray had penetrated all the way through Jim's body, lacerating his lungs and most likely affecting the veins and arteries as well. There was no spurting blood, but there _was_ blood, lots of it, everywhere, and more and more was coming. It was all over Jim and on Spock's hands and pooling on the dusty ground.

Except that it was not real because it could not have been really happening.

It was like a dream, all existence became foggy and distant, as if the view was out of focus and there was a low persistent hum coming from deep within the abysses of nothingness. Spock watched himself automatically go through the possibilities – it was simple: there were none. The communicators had been taken from them and they were alone in the waste land, with no one around to help.

But there was no help needed because it was not happening.

And if it was ... it was over. Everything. The Universe had collapsed in on itself and Spock was caught in a strange hazy limbo that made him relive his worst nightmares. He felt worn-out and numb and only kept wishing that he could just be rescued from there, from all of it, not to have to think about anything anymore to forget and -

Forcefully, he roused himself from the dazedness. Jim was dying and that was a fact. But now he was still alive, shivering and twitching, a trickle of blood coming from his mouth.

"Jim," Spock said, wincing at the rasping sound of his own voice. But it brought him fully back to reality.

Jim's half-closed eyelids quivered, but he didn't open them. There was only one thing left for Spock to do. The last duty. He brought his shaking fingers to Jim's temple, smearing it with red blood, and -

Chaos enveloped him. Impressions and memories, images and sounds, tastes and feelings, sensations and perceptions, shouts and whispers, they all rushed around him, all convoluted and impossibly accelerated. They were all intangible in their momentariness, appearing and disappearing, fleeting and evanescent – but a common thread ran through them, a sense of ultimate urgency _This is the end This is the end This is the end_ they sang.

Spock wanted to stay and absorb all of them, save them, keep them, cherish them – but no, this was not his purpose. With great effort he tore away from their center and forced himself to disregard them, to forget them, not to let them conceal what he had come to find. But he could not find it.

Was it too late? _No, no, please no. Let it not be too late, this is the last thing, the last wish, the last mission._

Suddenly, the curtain of illusions opened and another consciousness reached out for him.

_Spock. This is the end. There was so much and now it's gone. So much to do and never to be done._ Calm and composed.

Spock immediately lost all the resolve with which he had entered and gave in to his heart's desire. _No, do not go, wait, a little longer, please, a little longer!_ He tried to grasp at him, halt him, restrain him – but all in vain.

_This is the end. For me. Not for you. You know what you need to do._

_NO! Please wait, a little longer a little longer. Let me go with you, t'hy'la, I will try -_

_No. You understand. I have always loved you and always will._ Spock felt the other consciousness drifting away from him, ever so slowly, but growing more and more unreachable with every passing moment. The most precious moments in his life. The anxiety in him rose.

_No! I want to -_

But then Jim moved over the edge of the precipice and he was gone, gone beyond, to where he could no longer reach him. There was a searing stab of pain as the bond broke and the pain built up and reverberated all throughout his own mind, whirled in circles and each was a bit more unbearable than the previous one and it reached the absolute peak of bearability and went a little over it – and then … all dissolved in darkness.

And the rest was silence.

*

When he awoke the world was impossibly crisp and loud around him, his eyes wet and stinging, every grain of sand jutting into his back, every single muscle aching, the pain in his shoulder reminding him of the wound he had sustained, his mind active and alert.

So very much alive.

And he was lying next to the cold rigid body of his … everything. It was dusk and the stars in the sky above were bright, silently watching the Universe around them, as they always did, all the joy and happiness, all the sorrow and desperation. They were so distant and unreachable, but even so, they were there and always would be.

So tonight the stars watched as Spock cleaned the dried blood from the face of his t'hy'la, took the dead body in his arms and carried it away, away from the place that would haunt him forever.

*****

_This was a response to a prompt on the LJ Kink Meme (yeah, another one) and I just made myself tear up writing it. But obviously I can't tell whether it conveys the same sentiment for other people, too, so sorry about the fail if it doesn't._

_As for Jim, I guess it's better to go in a semi-blaze of glory after saving your friend's life than to have a goddamn BRIDGE fall on you, right?_

_Please review._


End file.
